and abc as well.
While poking at my Pretty folder with a stick I added some columns to file manager. What I found was interesting. The recordings highlighted in blue are the bad recordings. Notice how most of them don't have a Data Rate or a length. There are some outliers. Notice also that the ones with length times they are all wrong.

I don't know if it is related but I did just turn EIT data off last week. I was using Schedules direct AND EIT data and the EIT data was screwing up the show descriptions. The show would be like Sesame Street and the description would be from a totally different show. So I turned it off.

I just tried all 3 files you posted in the first post on my LinHES 6.03 system with Myth .23 and they all play perfectly with no stutter. The Raising Hope clip passed Dolby Digital to my amp, the other two did not. Looking at the logs you posted de-interlacing is being disabled so I don't think it has anything to do with that.

From the logs it looks like you are using digital audio. Have you tried changing your audio output to stereo just to test? I know it wouldn't be ideal long term.

I just tried all 3 files you posted in the first post on my LinHES 6.03 system with Myth .23 and they all play perfectly with no stutter. The Raising Hope clip passed Dolby Digital to my amp, the other two did not. Looking at the logs you posted de-interlacing is being disabled so I don't think it has anything to do with that.

Hi Britney. How did you play back the files? They way you do it makes a difference. Did you import them into the VIDEOS folder and configure the video player to use the built-in mythtv player, and NOT use mplayer? You see, mplayer plays these problem files fine so it doesn't reveal when something is wrong.

Note, that I just added another video clip link to the first post. This clip is a Fox/KMSP clip from May 5, 2010 (pre-summer) and this plays fine in ALL players I have, including the myth built-in player and VLC Player.

brfransen wrote:

From the logs it looks like you are using digital audio. Have you tried changing your audio output to stereo just to test? I know it wouldn't be ideal long term.

Britney

I'm using the analog audio ouptuts of the AD1986 sound chip on the motherboard. The analog output goes to the analog audio input of my Sony HDTV. I've never used the digital audio output.

Is the file a 1080i file? I'm only having problems with 720p files on Fox and ABC. It took me such a long time to get digital audio working that I'm afraid to go back to analog even to test the theory.

EDIT: OK just looked at your files they have the same missing Meta Data problem as mine. The "total bitrate" is listed as 256 kbps on the broken file (vs 13783 kbps), the time is 00:00:00
According to VLC the good video is 720p just under 120 fps MPEG-1/2 and the audio is 48khz and 192kb/s
the bad file there are no "Codec Details".

It really does appear that there is a problem with the recordings not with the playback. It is amazing how well the mythtv player deals with such troublesome files

OK I was able to pause the video for the short one second that VLC showed it on the screen. I was then able to look at the codec info. The difference seems to be in the audio (duh!) the good file is 48/192 stereo the bad file is 48 kb/s 448 khz 5.1 I went through and checked all of my "bad" recordings all of them had AC3 audio bitrates of 448 khz except for the Grinch movie which had a 320 kb/s. These are real bitrates not mp3 style bitrates. The Simpsons episode was stereo but all the others were in 5.1.

I checked my "The Sing Off" recordings they are both 1080i 59.940059 frames per second (that's 60 vs the bad files 120) the audio is 5.1, 48 kHz 384 kb/s.

Gosh darnit I'm gonna find the answere eventually!!
Should I post this somewhere else like Gossamer threads or someplace that will catch the attention of the V4L people?

How did you play back the files? They way you do it makes a difference. Did you import them into the VIDEOS folder and configure the video player to use the built-in mythtv player, and NOT use mplayer?

I did put them in my videos directory and played them back using the internal player. The internal player has been my default player for a couple of years now and I find I only have to use mplayer very infrequently. In my experience, the internal player in Myth .23 is much better at playing back various formats than .21 was.

neutron68 wrote:

I'm using the analog audio ouptuts of the AD1986 sound chip on the motherboard. The analog output goes to the analog audio input of my Sony HDTV. I've never used the digital audio output.

Sorry, I confused your logs with mattbatt's. I see you are using analog.

Brittney,
Thanks for the clarification on your playback tests!
It appears that the built-in mythtv player in R6 (with myth 0.23) is a known-good player.
Which version/subversion of R6 are you running? The same version as on the 6.03 install cd? Or updated from that?
Do all versions of R6 have myth 0.23 in them?
Could you make some short recordings of Fox network programs (not local news, etc.) off the Sioux Falls Fox affiliate and post them somewhere I could download them? (Sendspace limits files to 300MGB or less).
Since your myth setup plays Fox files ok, you could test them in VLC Player and see if they will not play, like we see with the Fox/KMSP recordings.

mattbatt,
Your signature line says you are running R6.
What exact version/subversion of R6? The same as Brittney?
I'm guessing your versions of R6 are different since you are getting different playback results when looking at our same broken Fox files.
If your R6 version is older than Brittney's, then an update to his version may solve your problem. For me, I have to go from R5.5 up to R6.0 then up to R6.03 - a longer path.
Do you recall when your Fox 720p recordings became a problem?
Mine started sometime during the summer of 2010 - late August, I think.

tjc,
You mentioned that you could make some test recordings from your Boston Fox station.
Have you had a chance to do that exercise?
What version/subversion of R6 are you running?
Do your Boston Fox recordings play ok in VLC Player, or do they freeze at the first frame the not play any farther?

several things happened in my entertainement life around the same time so it is hard to keep track I cut cable went OTA, Got a new HDTV,got a good antenna and mounted it in the roof b/c my other one was having too many dropouts, and switched to digital audio. That all happened around September and then my large hard drive failed and I lost most of my recordings. I can't remember when the problem started. I know I wasn't having any of these problems before all of those changes. This is a rough weekend for me I'll try and do a fresh install as soon as I can.

Since your myth setup plays Fox files ok, you could test them in VLC Player and see if they will not play, like we see with the Fox/KMSP recordings.

VLC won't playback most of my recent recordings. Doesn't matter what network they were recording from.

Britney

Hi Britney, thanks for your version info.

How can we read that detailed version info from our machines? Command line command or from one of the LinHES menu items?

Could you make some short recordings of Fox network programs (not local news, etc.) off the Sioux Falls Fox affiliate and post them somewhere I could download them? (Sendspace limits files to 300MB or less).

tjc, have you done any test recordings of Fox in your area? Do you have several myth boxes up and running so we could see how various versions handle Fox recordings? I'm interested to know if you also see stuttering during playback of Fox recordings.

Yes, 6.03 works fine for me here in the Boston 'burbs with Fox 25 (WFXT HD), but memory says it also worked fine in R5.5.

Sorry to butt in, but almost 2 years ago I was having problems with ABC and FOX on certain shows (typically 1 hour primetime TV I think) where the audio was getting out of sync with video, then catching back up again, things were choppy, etc. I never did get a definitive answer on it, but I found an article somewhere online (links in the post linked below) which mentioned someone with similar problems maybe on satellite TV where they were essentially dropping frames to speed up the playback and fit in an extra commercial.

I haven't read all of the posts here, so I don't know if this fits your bill, but fortunately mine just went away on its own after a few months. I don't know if it will help you, but I just thought I'd throw it out there.
http://knoppmyth.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.p ... highlight=

tjc, have you done any test recordings of Fox in your area? Do you have several myth boxes up and running so we could see how various versions handle Fox recordings? I'm interested to know if you also see stuttering during playback of Fox recordings.

Yes, 6.03 works fine for me here in the Boston 'burbs with Fox 25 (WFXT HD), but memory says it also worked fine in R5.5.

Hi tjc,
Thanks for the report that Fox in Boston it works fine with R6.03. That lines up with Brittney's experience.

In regard to testing R5.5 with Fox, keep in mind that one of the variables here is the point in time the recording was made.
Everything I recorded off Fox using R5.5 worked fine BEFORE the summer of 2010.
Evidence shows that Fox made changes to their data stream over the summer of 2010.
If you still have your R5.5 machine running and can make a Fox recording test now, that will be a helpful test.

Could you make some short recordings of Fox network programs (not local news, etc.) off the Boston Fox affiliate and post them somewhere I could download them? (Sendspace limits files to 300MB or less).

keep in mind that one of the variables here is the point in time the recording was made.

I only switched the production box over to 6.03 in late October, based on some key file time stamps it was on 2010-10-24. Since I don't have any old Fox recordings available, everything was tested with both R5.5 and R6.03 using live broadcasts, or playing back fresh "live tv" category stuff as recordings.

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